An elective monarchy constitutes the _Government_ of Bornou,[28] and like the similar system of Cashna, endangers the happiness, while it acknowledges the power of the people. On the death of the Sovereign, the privilege of chusing among his sons, without regard to priority of birth, a successor to his throne, is conferred by the nation on three of the most distinguished men, whose age and character for wisdom, are denoted by their title of Elders; and whose conduct in the State has invested them with the public esteem. Bound by no other rule as to their judgment or restraint, as to their will, than that which the expressed or implied instruction of electing the most worthy may form, they retire to the appointed place of their secret deliberation, the avenues to which are carefully guarded by the people: and while the contending suggestions of private interest, or a sense of the real difficulty of chusing where judgment may easily err, and error may be fatal to the State, keeps them in suspence, the Princes are closely confined in separate chambers of the Palace. Their choice being made, they proceed to the apartment of the Sovereign elect, and conduct him, in silence, to the gloomy place in which the unburied corpse of his father, that cannot be interred till this awful ceremony is passed, awaits his arrival. There, the Elders point out to him the several virtues and the several defects which marked the character of his departed parent; and they also forcibly describe, with just panegyric, or severe condemnation, the several measures which raised or depressed the glory of his reign. “You see before you the end of your _mortal_ career; the _eternal_, which succeeds to it, will be miserable or happy in proportion as your reign shall have proved a curse or a blessing to your people.” From this dread scene of terrible instruction, the new Sovereign, amidst the loud acclamations of the people, is conducted back to the Palace, and is there invested by the electors with all the slaves, and with two-thirds of all the lands and cattle of his father; the remaining third being always detained as a provision for the other children of the deceased Monarch. No sooner is the Sovereign invested with the ensigns of Royalty, than such of his brothers as have reached the age of manhood prostrate themselves at his feet, and in rising press his hands to their lips—the two ceremonies that constitute the declaration of allegiance. If any doubt of their sincerity suggests itself to the King or to the Elders, death or perpetual imprisonment removes the fear; but if no suspicion arises, an establishment of lands and cattle from the possessions of their father, together with presents of slaves from the reigning monarch, are liberally bestowed upon them.